


Not What You Think We Are

by escritoireazul



Category: Make It or Break It
Genre: Gen, Gymnastics, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-14
Updated: 2010-12-14
Packaged: 2017-10-13 16:32:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/139357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escritoireazul/pseuds/escritoireazul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Emily is not what they think she is, but only Payson sees.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not What You Think We Are

**Author's Note:**

  * For [turnonmyheels](https://archiveofourown.org/users/turnonmyheels/gifts).



> Title from "We are Golden" by Mika.  
> Spoilers through 1.10 "All that Glitters." Set during "All that Glitters."

_We are not what you think we are,  
We are golden. We are golden._  
Mika "We Are Golden"

Emily’s stomach churns, and she thinks it’s probably even odds that she’ll puke yet again and start the second day of Nationals just as bad as she started the first. She grips her eyeliner tightly and focuses on breathing, counting to five as she breathes in and five as she breathes out.

It helps a little, she doesn’t have to duck into the bathroom to throw up, but her hands start shaking so bad she changes her bet. Money’s on her poking her eye so it’s red and swollen and she can’t see very well, because surely _that_ will help her make the national team.

“Hey.” Payson puts her hand on Emily’s shoulder. “Breathe.”

“I _am_ breathing.” It comes out sharp and immediately she feels guilty. Payson is the only one who’s really been nice to her, made her feel welcome. Kaylie comes and goes and each day is a new day and maybe she’s Emily’s friend and maybe she’s not, and Lauren’s just a privileged rich little asshole, but Payson understands that deep down need to _win_. Maybe for Payson it’s about being the best, and for Emily it’s just about proving she belongs, showing everyone she’s not just some charity case faking it until she makes it, but underneath the polish, underneath the flair, it’s all the same need, the same fire in the belly.

“Yeah, well, breathe some more.” Payson smiles, a little quirk of her lips, and plucks the eyeliner from Emily’s fingers. “Let me do that. Can’t have our captain making a mess of her face.”

Sharp words bubble up, but Emily bites them back and turns to face Payson instead of the mirror. Payson’s hands are steady as she carefully lines Emily’s upper eyelids. She doesn’t stop there, she grabs the shadow next, then mascara, and finally blush. She breathes slowly through her nose as she works and Emily finds herself matching her breathing to Payson’s.

It takes her a good five minutes to realize hey, that’s probably what Payson wanted, but by then her make-up is done.

She looks at herself in the mirror. Next to her, Payson does the same. They don’t look real, their faces made up, their hair so perfectly pulled back, and their team leotards shining in the bright light.

“It’s so stupid.” Payson touches her cheek, wipes away a slight smudge.

Emily finds herself transfixed, watching Payson’s fingers move, the way her strong hands flex. It takes her a second to even figure out that Payson said anything and then her tongue feels too big and thick to speak.

She bites the inside of her mouth, trying to shock herself back to normal. This is weird, this bumbling, speechless moment with Payson, and she doesn’t really know what to make of it.

“What’s stupid?” she asks at last.

“All this.” Payson gestures at her reflection in the mirror, at _Emily’s_ reflection, and something thick catches in Emily’s throat. But Payson keeps talking. “Playing dress-up just to go out there and show what we can do. It should be about the moves, how well we do them. We shouldn’t have to wear make-up and smile so big and pretend we love the judges and play up to the audience. The only thing that should matter is how good we are.”

Sort of, Emily agrees, and she nods. But sort of, too, she thinks Payson is wrong. Because sometimes, what happens off the mat, that’s such a huge deal too. Like, she’s good and she’s getting better, but would she have been good enough for the Rock if she’d come out of another elite gym and not from the Y? How much of her story is the reason she’s here now, struggling to make the National Team? Can she really separate that from whatever talent she has?

Her story makes her Emily, and Emily is the one with that all-important skill. If it’s just about the moves, just about the technical skill, is _Emily_ all important too?

Those thoughts make her head hurt. She puts them aside to deal with later.

“Hey.” Payson’s voice is softer. Emily looks up and Payson meets her gaze in the mirror. “I know you can do this.”

Emily’s breath catches. She’s heard that from her mother, from her brother, from Sasha, but all she can remember in that moment is every single time the kids around her taunted her. They pushed her in their own way, without meaning it, but never, _not once_ , did any of them tell her she could do it.

“Thanks.” Emily manages to stumble over that one word and to her horror, her eyes burn with tears, but Payson just holds her gaze, steady and strong and true.

***

Emily’s eight and doing flips on the sidewalk in front of school, forward and back, while she waits for her neighbor to pick her up, along with her neighbor’s two kids. They’re both little, five and six, and have to stand with their teachers while they wait, but she can break away from hers and do tricks as long as she doesn’t hurt anyone.

“Hey!” A shrill voice catches her off guard and she stumbles a little coming out of a backflip but doesn’t fall.

“What?” She puts her hands on her hips, mimicking a move her mom does.

“I bet you can’t do a round-off back tuck.” The girl, Tina maybe, crosses her arms over her chest and sneers. She’s _eleven_ and a little snot according to Emily’s mom and this isn’t the first time Emily’s run into her. It’s just the first time she’s not mocked Emily’s thrift store clothes or choppy haircut. (It’s choppy on purpose, her mom says it’s going to be the next big haircut, but it just looks weird.) Her big sister is a cheerleader and she does gymnastics at the actual fancy school.

Emily wipes her hands on her hips. Her palms are weirdly sweaty. “I can too,” she snaps, not really thinking about it, because really, she’s never tried it before.

“Can’t!” Tina actually taps her foot like she’s trying to be a grown-up or something.

“Can too!” The more she says it, the more Emily believes it. Her body feels light, sort of floaty, like she could do anything if she tried. That’s what happens when you tell her she can’t do something. That feeling’s why she’ll end up on the roof of a middle school a few years later, why she broke her arm when she was six trying to flip off the monkey bars, why at thirteen she hits her head so hard falling off the beam everything’s blurry for three days but she can’t tell her mom because then she’ll worry and try to take her to the emergency room and they can’t afford it.

Why at eight she backs up and takes a running start and throws herself into it. As soon as her feet leave the ground, it’s not about Tina anymore and not about proving she can do it because someone said she can’t, it’s about the way her body feels like she’s flying.

Emily only barely lands it and she staggers a little, and her feet actually hurt from hitting the concrete so hard, but it’s good enough, she did it, and she raises her arms in a triumphant vee.

“Emily Kmetko!” Her teacher’s voice is loud and higher pitched than normal and when she grabs Emily’s shoulder, her fingers feel like claws. “You could have broken your neck!”

 _But I didn’t_ , Emily thinks but is smart enough not to say. She can’t stop smiling, not the whole time her teacher yells at her and Tina giggles and whispers with her friends, obviously happy that she got Emily in trouble even if Emily did what she said couldn’t be done.

***

Emily has never been as scared as she is when she watches Payson fall from the bars. There’s a long moment where she can’t breathe, because she’s absolutely certain that Payson’s neck snapped when she hit the mat and all the air is sucked out of the gym.

Then Emily’s running forward without realizing it, lungs burning because she still can’t breathe, but it doesn’t matter when Payson’s on the ground, eyes closed and all the color gone from her face. The make-up she so carefully applied stands out like clown paint on her skin.

 _She’s right_ , Emily thinks incongruously, _none of this should matter._

Not the make-up.

Not the moves.

Nothing but Payson getting up, but she doesn’t.

Emily staggers to a stop and she can’t stop staring as Sasha and Payson’s parents crowd around her. She wants to be there too, pressing her fingers to Payson’s wrist to feel her heartbeat, to prove she’s still alive, because right now, she looks dead. Instead Emily clenches her hands into fists and watches close, waiting for the rise and fall of Payson’s chest that shows she’s still breathing.

Kaylie grabs Emily and holds on tight, clinging to her, but Emily can barely feel her nails dig in. After a second Emily opens her fists and lets Kaylie take her hand, linking them, the quick beat of their pulses, the terror racing through their veins.

***

Emily’s eyes burn as she watches the medics roll Payson out on the stretcher. Kaylie’s arm is too tight around her waist, her hand gripping Emily’s side hard. Where Kaylie holds Lauren’s hand, their knuckles are white.

She still can’t breathe, only manages tiny little gulps that leave her head spinning. She’s up next, she needs to focus, she still has to try to make the National Team, but all she can see is the moment Payson’s head hit the mat, the way her body bounced and the sharp angle of her neck.

Sasha tries to give them a pep talk, and he tries hard, but his words sound fuzzy and distant and unimportant. Emily blinks hard, trying to hold back the tears. If she cries, she’ll smear Payson’s carefully applied make-up.

Then, almost before she realizes it, she’s getting ready to start her floor routine. Tears sting her eyes and her chest is too tight, but she can hear Payson in her head: _I know you can do this._

This is it. This is her last chance to make the National Team, and if half her mind and most of her heart are off with Payson, there’s still enough left to do this. She can do this for her mom and her brother and for Damon, who came all the way to Boston to cheer her on. She can do this for Payson, who gave her belief to Emily even while she chased her own dream.

She can do this for herself.

Emily takes a deep breath, the first full one since Payson fell, and gathers up all her terror and fear and anger and frustration and love, intangible as it is, and shoves it into sinew and muscle and bone.

As the music starts, Emily thinks of Payson and everything inside her explodes.

***

The moment she knows she made the National Team, two emotions collide so hard Emily goes numb with it: A fierce joy that threatens to make her heart burst, and guilt so deep she wants to melt away and disappear.

She made the National Team. Payson was right, she did it, she did what they said couldn’t be done.

She wouldn’t be in if Payson wasn’t out.

Tears actually escape this time, squeezing out the corners of her eyes, but she pastes on a smile and steps forward to let them put on her jacket, dressing her like their little doll; to take her spot in the line-up; to accept her flowers and hold them high in honor of the Rock and the team and Payson, the ghost who lingers in their thoughts.

 _I’m sorry_ , she thinks but won’t say, because then she’d have to try to explain this joy tempered with guilt and sorrow and Emily absolutely does not have the words.

***

Right before she leaves Payson’s room, Emily tucks a petal from her bouquet under Payson’s pillow. Payson’s asleep after another round of meds, or at least Emily thinks she’s asleep, but when she pulls her hand away, she finds Payson watching her.

Emily’s lips tremble, because she’s going to cry again and because there’s so much she wants to say but doesn’t know how. Instead she brushes her fingers against Payson’s, those strong hands gone still, and waits for Payson to close her eyes again before she walks away.


End file.
